


Broken

by elaiel



Category: Stargate Universe
Genre: Aftermath of Torture, Fear, Infiltration, M/M, Paranoia, Rape, Rape Aftermath, Rape Recovery, Torture
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2012-10-06
Updated: 2012-10-06
Packaged: 2017-11-15 18:50:06
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,136
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/530522
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/elaiel/pseuds/elaiel
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Infiltrators to Homeworld Command manage to do the unthinkable to find out information they need.</p><p>N.B. This fic is extremely dark and potentially triggering, please read notes.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Broken

**Author's Note:**

> I give you fair warning at the beginning, this fic is dark, explicitly violent, and will quite probably be triggering for those who have issues with the things I've included in the tags. 
> 
> Additionally this story is a work in progress and has been so for some time. Please don't ask for updates, It will be updated in the future at some point, I have more written, but I have to be in the right headspace to work on it, as it has required research into things like Rape Trauma Syndrome, PTSD and post rape aftermath for male rape victims, not easy topics to get to grips with. I have a strong opinion that if you are going to write about something as terrible as rape, you have the responsibility to take a seriously as a topic.

Broken.   
  
That was the only way that Young could describe what was before him. He could see black hair and patches of skin and smears of blood and what, he realised in horror, might be bone. It took him precious seconds to drag his eyes away from the picture in front of him and look around and he realised that though he was still quite evidently back on Destiny, he had no idea where he was. He realised he had only moments before the effects of dropping out of FTL would reverse. Young dropped to his knees and it was only at that point he realised he had a knife in his hand, he threw it from him it like it burned and it clattered away on the decking. He reached out to turn the head of the unknown body sprawled on the floor and suddenly saw that his arms were bloody to the elbows.   
  
Carefully he turned the head, fingers sliding through blood and shocked realised it was Rush, his hair so bloody it was black in the pale light.   
  
And he woke, standing in his motel room in the dark, back on Earth, in a body not his own. Immediately he looked for the telephone. It lay smashed, cable pulled out of the wall, the mobile phone he was given crushed on the floor next to it. He grabbed his pants from the chair, pulling them on, thoughts hurtling through his mind. Whose body was he actually in? He tried to remember. Whoever it was had had the presence of mind to realise that he would automatically try to phone in and get the stones pulled. He hadn’t got long to react before whoever it was finished up with Rush and went to disconnect the stones.   
  
Shit! He had to find a phone. He needed to confine whoever the body belonged to. Shoving his feet into shoes without doing them up, he walked out of the motel room. There had to be a maintenance room round here somewhere. He found some sort of a shed and with two sharp thrusts born straight out of adrenaline kicked the door off its hinges. He groped around, found a light switch and after a moment of digging through maintenance supplies found some cable ties.   
  
Another moment of panic and swift work with his foot and he was in an unused motel room. He sat on the bed and cable tied his ankles together, then grabbed the phone and tapped in a number.   
  
“This is Colonel Everett Young, 43697. I need you to record this call and pass it to General O’Neill immediately, or Telford if you can’t get O’Neill. I’m in a motel, trace this call for the address, I’ve swapped with an Airman Daniels, but he’s compromised. Wait a sec…” he laid the phone on the bed, propping his head on it, “can you still hear me? Good.” He moved the cable tie round his wrists, tightening it as far as he could with fingers. “Airman Daniels is compromised. Destiny just dropped out of FTL and we temporarily swapped back. Daniels has been torturing Doctor Rush, I don’t know how long for, but he’s in a very bad way…” he paused to pull the cable tie tight with his teeth. “…I’ve confined myself, I’m cable tied on the bed in room 67 but you need to pull the stones and get someone out here to pick up Daniels.”   
  
He relaxed minutely knowing there was nothing he could do and waited, he just had to wait to swap back. The cable ties hurt, but he pulled his bound wrists up to his face to look at his watch. He had bound his left wrist behind his right without thinking and he had to force his elbows together and his wrists round painfully to see the time, but he realised it had been less than five minutes since he had awoken. Seconds ticked past painfully.   
  
The bottom dropped out of the world and he was back on Destiny, smelling blood and something worse, falling to his knees in front of Rush on the floor. There was so much blood and he couldn’t see if Rush was alive or breathing, but fumbled at his neck for a pulse. Rushed moaned and it was so quiet he wasn’t sure if he’d heard it. Finally he found a pulse fluttering against his fingers, and let out a breath in relief.   
  
“Rush!” he said, then more urgently. “Rush!”   
  
There was no response and he sat back on his heels, trying to still his thoughts, concentrate and work out what to do. He started to assess Rush’s condition, foetal on the floor back to the wall and Young realised Rush was naked from the waist down. There were strips of his jeans still bound round each ankle and wrist and when he looked up, matching strips, with cut ends on the pipes above them on the walls. A mounting horror grew in the pit of Young’s stomach and he stepped back, standing up and looking down at himself. He was covered in blood, all up his arms, more than before, soaked into the fabric of his t shirt and when he finally managed to still the nausea in his stomach and lift his t-shirt, it was wet, recent, plastered down his stomach, disappearing below the waistband of his pants. He spun away from Rush and lost the contents of his stomach over the decking, retching, nauseated, horrified.   
  
Young wiped bile from his mouth with the back of his hand and tasted blood, tried not to retch again and actually looked around. They were in an area that looked like an engineering level, pipes and consoles and bulkheads, equipment he had no idea of. He looked to see what Airman Daniels had brought with him, but all Daniels has left on the floor is his shirt, a knife and a gun. Young looked at them, but couldn’t bring himself to touch them, the thought brought another wave of nausea.   
  
The console was no help, he didn’t speak any quantity of Ancient and all the options and buttons were different to the ones he had learned to use by rote on the Bridge. He stared at it, somewhere in there was a messaging system, but whilst he could write his own name, and Rush’s, in Ancient he had no idea where to find the messaging system and thoughts of hitting the wrong commands and causing shipwide issues kept his hands hovering over the console. He gave up and walked back to Rush, looking down at him.   
  
“Rush,”   
  
There was no response. He reached down and touched him, a bit of unbloodied skin, at least there it shouldn’t have hurt, but Rush flinched anyway, a minute movement but sickening under Young’s touch.   
  
“Rush, I need to check you over to see where you’re hurt.”   
  
Another minute movement as Young crouched next to him. Young pushed the blood soaked hair from Rush’s face, his face was beaten, lip split and one eye swollen, the other closed tightly shut, there were cut marks on his cheeks, shallow and scabbed over. Young could smell vomit and see it caked in Rush’s hair.   
  
Rush wouldn’t uncurl, but as Young surveyed his body, he could see that Rush was covered in bruises and shallow knife cuts, He moved round to see Rush’s back and there were marks that could only be described as lashes, and he could see the edge of a belt, Rush’s belt, poking out from underneath him. Worst of all was the blood and worse, still clotted and disgustingly moist on Rush’s thighs and another wave of nausea almost overcame Young.   
  
Young swayed, slapping a hand against the wall to balance and not fall onto Rush. He pushed back off the wall to sprawl on the floor before he fell. Dizziness overwhelmed him. There was nothing he could do for Rush here, not even any water.   
  
Young stood, there was no choice but to leave Rush and take a look around, try and find where they were. He had no doubt they were a long way into the bowels of the ship, far from anyone who might have disturbed this… this…Young’s mind wouldn’t let him latch onto a word for what had happened. He was almost thankful for that until he looked back at Rush on the floor.   
  
He took the discarded shirt and used it to cover Rush up at least from the waist down and finally the man cracked an eye and whimpered.   
  
“It’s me Rush, Young.”   
  
The man’s look was frankly terrified and Young crouched down in front of him again.   
  
“It’s me, not him.” He repeated. “Young.”   
  
There was a noise, through broken lips, that might have been his name, then Rush’s eye shut tight again, like a dog expecting another blow.   
  
“I’ll get us out of here.” He promised Rush. “I’ll get us back.”   
  
He turned away and walked to where a corridor led off the area, looking back to where Rush lay on the floor. A single dark eye stared at him, then flinched and closed. Young turned back to the corridor and amazingly heard footsteps. His heart leapt.   
  
Airman Channing walked into view.   
  
“Thank god, Channing.” He said. “I need TJ down here now.”   
  
Channing said nothing, just walked towards him, gun in hand. He had the sudden realisation that Channing was the other person using the stones at the same time as him. Channing lifted the gun and pointed it at him. Young backed off, staying in the doorway, blocking his line of sight to Rush.   
  
“Back up Young.” The unknown person said.   
  
“Look, I…”   
  
“Back up or I shoot you now.” The voice was cold and certain.   
  
Young looked at the man, gun held steady in his hand, easy confidence, no qualms, whoever he was he was a professional. The man took a step forward and Young backed up, keeping himself between not-Channing and Rush.   
  
“What do you want?” he asked.   
  
“We’ve got what we want now.” The man said. “I’ll be gone before you know it, and there’ll be nothing you can do about it.”   
  
Young looked at him.   
  
“That’s what you tortured Rush for, for information.”   
  
“Of course, you didn’t think we’d do it for fun.” The voice displayed disgust.   
  
“Except your friend did enjoy it, a little too much.” Young spat the words out. “Had his fun.”   
  
“He knew Simeon.” Said the man as if that explained everything. Maybe it did.   
  
“Now what, you hold us prisoner until the connection is broken and you go back?”   
  
The man said nothing, just gestured with the gun, indicating Young to move away, out of the line between him and Rush. Young stood firm, putting his hands up in front of him, palms flat towards the man.   
  
"We're no threat to you now". He said. “Why do you need Rush still?”   
  
“I don’t.” The reply was flat. “I need him out of the way. You have a simple choice, either he dies, or you both do.”   
  
“What earthly reason could you have for killing him?”   
  
Young knew it sounded dumb, but he was playing for time here, a break, any break. The man’s eyes narrowed and he took another step forward.   
  
“Look Young,” said the man sharply, “it’s very simple, you get out of the way, I shoot him, I leave. He is a complication, you are a nothing. There’s nothing you can do to prevent what’s going to happen. Get out of the way.”   
  
The last words were ground out, pitiless and cold. The gun raised, and steadied as the man took a step to the side, aiming for Rush. Young’s vision narrowed to the barrel of the gun as he threw himself backwards into the path of the bullet. Pain bloomed in his shoulder as the bullet ripped through his pectoral muscle, he hit the floor hard, scrabbling back to cover Rush. Somewhere back here was a gun. He felt his back hit Rush and twisted as the gun fired again, a bullet ripping through his thigh, the pain was overwhelming and his vision greyed out then back in again. He scrabbled with the last vestiges of his self control for the gun. The man raised the gun for a last shot. Young waited for the final shot, knowing it had to come, knowing he’d feel it, no one died instantly from gun shot wounds unless they were a head shot and somehow he didn’t have this guy pegged for merciful.   
  
Young heard the gun go off, but the expected pain didn’t arrive. He lay there, gasping in pain as a second shot echoed in the room. Still no bullet hitting him. He dragged his eyes open. Arms stretched out above him, one supporting the other, shaking, gun in hand. The arms swayed and collapsed down onto him as he blacked out.   
  
  
  
The search party walked into the room. Barnes taking in the body on the floor and the two men collapsed by the wall. She raised her radio.   
  
“Eli, get TJ down here now, we’re in the second corridor off the engineering section you indicated.”   
  
There was blood, lots of blood. She walked past the body over to Young and what she assumed had to be Rush, both appeared unconscious. Young was mostly dressed, but a pad had been bound tightly to a wound in his thigh and a further one to a shoulder wound. The pads were made of what appeared to be shirt and tied on with strips of denim. Rush was mostly hidden behind Young and it wasn’t until she stepped closer that she realised firstly he was almost naked and secondly he was clinging to Young so tight his knuckles were white. Stepping round their feet she caught sight of something that made her gasp and turn to Baras, standing in the doorway.   
  
“Get out!” she said. “Take the body and get out!”   
  
“What?” Baras looked confused.   
  
“Get out now,” she repeated, “no-one comes in here till TJ has seen them. You say nothing about this to anyone.”   
  
She crouched and touched Young’s face, searching for a pulse. It was faint and felt thready under her fingers, but it was there. As she leaned over him, she saw Rush flinch.   
  
“It’s okay.” She said. “I’m not gonna touch you. I’ve sent for TJ.”   
  
She checked the two makeshift bandages, but there didn’t seem to be any blood escaping. She just crouched there next to them, talking quietly, she had no idea what she was talking about, just a monologue of reassurance until TJ walked through the door. She looked up to see TJ stop in shock, then recover quickly, put her professional face on and take a step into the room.   
  
Barnes stood and stepped away from the two men.   
  
“TJ.” She walked forward and caught the woman by the shoulder, leaning into speak in her ear. “Young’s been shot,” she said quietly, “shoulder and leg, but from what I can see one of them managed to get makeshift pressure bandages on and he’s not bleeding out. Rush,” she took a deep breath and dropped her voice even lower, “he’s been fucked over pretty badly, he’s been tortured and I think he’s been…” She stopped, swallowing. “I think they abused him.” She said finally.   
  
TJ’s eyes widened, she took a deep breath in and then turned to Baras.   
  
“Tell Eli I need his kino sled down here, and blankets.”   
  
She walked over to the two men, kneeling in front of Young, opening her medical kit. Young lay on his side, Rush was mostly concealed behind him. She took her shirt off and put it over Rush, covering him up somewhat.   
  
“Are you awake?” she asked.   
  
A dark eye looked at her tensely.   
  
“I’m going to treat Colonel Young’s wounds, then I’m going to take a look at you and get you both back to the infirmary.”   
  
There was no response, just a blank, terrified stare. She leaned forward and taking out safety shears, cut Young’s shirt away, pulling it out from under the makeshift dressing. There was a slight ooze of blood, but nothing that she gave her any further cause for panic than the fact he had been shot already would. She cut away the makeshift bandage and as she took it away fresh blood began to ooze from the wound. She put the fresh dressing over it and began to strap it in place with tape, every time her hand slid behind Young to wrap the bandage she felt Rush flinch. Needing to dress the wound she ignored it and moved on to the thigh wound.   
  
She cut his trousers away to expose the wound, once again pulling them out from behind the makeshift dressing. This wound was a through and through and she cut his trousers away to the hip, exposing the dressing bound to both sides of his leg.   
  
“Good work.” She said quietly to Rush. There was no way Young could have done either dressing himself.   
  
Rush blinked at her but didn’t move.   
  
“I have to roll him over.” TJ said. “I need to get to his injured leg.”   
  
Another slow blink. She heard voices in the corridor and saw him flinch again. Barnes was preventing someone from coming in. TJ turned to the doorway.   
  
“Barnes, bring the sled in. No-one else comes in.”   
  
The voices hushed and Barnes pushed the sled over. TJ took a blanket from the sled and unfolding it, put it over Rush, before rolling Young back so she could cut the makeshift dressing away and treat his leg. The dressing came away cleanly, and again blood oozed from the wound, but not at a rate that indicated the bullet had caught the artery and she breathed a sigh of relief, quickly rebandaging the wound.   
  
She looked at Rush again, realising he had transferred his grip to Young’s arm.   
  
“We need to get him on the sled and up to the infirmary.” she said quietly. “You can go with him, or you can wait with Barnes and we’ll come back for you.”   
  
His knuckles whitened on Young’s arm.   
  
“Fine, together it is then.”   
  
With Barnes help she lifted Young onto the sled, throwing a blanket over him, glad it was wider than a gurney. Rush was still curled on the floor part covered in the blanket and she could see he was shaking. Without Young’s body in the way she could see his arms and chest and just how much blood was covering him and she gasped reflexively.   
  
“Can you stand?” she asked. No response, just a nervous double blink. She stepped forward. “This is going to hurt.” She said. She slid the kino sled in between him and the door as close as possible.   
  
She tried to tuck the blanket round his shuddering form then reaching under his arms hauled him briefly to his feet, spun him round neatly and lowered him down onto the kino sled. Rush cried out as she lifted him but then fell immediately silent and curled onto his side facing in towards Young. TJ sighed and threw another blanket over them.   
  
“Let’s get them upstairs.” She said to Barnes. She turned to speak to Baras and Eli standing out in the corridor, “I want cleared corridors between here and the infirmary, they’re both in a serious condition and I don’t need people staring and gossiping. Eli, take the front of the sled.”   
  
The trip to the infirmary was thankfully through deserted corridors. Baras was waiting at the infirmary door.   
  
“Come in a moment.” She said as they opened the door for her. She pushed the kino sled in between two beds. “Baras, Eli, you say nothing about this to anyone. All you say is that I’ve told you they are in a serious condition but I think they’ll recover from their injuries. That is not a lie, and we don’t need gossip that they’re dying. Now, I want you go back down there, record everything in that room with a kino and then clean it up. Eli, you secure the kino footage for later, no-one see it. Where’s Lieutenant Scott?”   
  
“Waiting for you to report.”   
  
“Radio him on the way down. Tell him I’ll report as soon as I’m able.”   
  
They left. Barnes looked at her with a question in her eyes.   
  
“You’re my nurse.” She said.   
  
She looked down. Rush was still conscious, shivering under the blanket.   
  
Walking over to a counter she charged a pressure hypodermic, walked up behind Rush and pressed it to his neck. With a hiss the sedative entered his system and within moments his good eye closed.   
  
They transferred Young to one bed and Rush to the other.   
  
“What do I do?” asked Barnes, staring in concern and slight panic at the almost naken man in front of her.   
  
“Start cleaning him up.” Said TJ. “I can’t do both at the same time and I need you to check he hasn’t got any major wounds.” She looked up at Barnes. “He needs this, and there isn’t anyone else to do it, he’s not going to wake up, just do it.”   
  
TJ went to work on Young, it was terrifying as she removed the bullet from his shoulder, fearing every minute she’d catch something and he’d start bleeding out again, but it came out mercifully cleanly and she cleaned and dressed the wound and went on to the leg wound. By the time she had finished both, Barnes had cleaned Rush’s face, arms, legs and back and was hovering over whether to clean him up further.   
  
Rush was a mess. His arms, chest and legs were covered in short, shallow cuts, already scabbing over and Barnes had already applied the topical antiseptic that TJ would have done. His back was another thing. Wide bleeding welts striped it from top to bottom, at least twenty. TJ sighed and swapped places with Barnes.   
  
“Strip him and wash the blood off of the Colonel.”   
  
She finished cleaning Rush up, all over, and in doing so came face to face with the evidence that backed up Barnes earlier suggestion. Rush had most definitely been violated. She cleaned him up, and gave him an internal exam. He was torn up but the bleeding had already stopped. She applied topical antiseptic with the hope that the emotional scars would be treatable as well.   
  
“Uh, Lieutenant?” Barnes voice was shaky.   
  
TJ looked over again and looked at what had stopped Barnes in her tracks. The blood caked over Young’s chest went all the way down and there was blood caked around his groin.   
  
“Wash it off.” She ordered, her voice started firmly but she heard it crack as she continued. “You say nothing about this. It’s bad enough having your body stolen without having to see the aftermath of what they’ve done with it. Do you want him to wake up to that?”   
  
They looked at each other with haunted eyes. Barnes gulped and washed him, self consciously but thoroughly.   
  
They finished and finally both men were laid back in as comfortable a position as possible and covered with blankets. TJ pulled screens round them and led Barnes over to the sink to wash up.   
  
“I never want to see that again.” Said Barnes as she dried her hands, tears rolled down her face.   
  
“Oh honey.” TJ wrapped her arms round her and hugged her as she sobbed. “It’s okay, you did what they needed you to do. I needed you to help too.”   
  
She sat Barnes down in her chair and went for the radio.   
  
“Scott, this is TJ.” She waited.   
  
“TJ, is everything okay?” His voice came back almost immediately.   
  
“Yeah, they’re resting now. You better come down to the infirmary.”   
  
Scott was there moments later. TJ beckoned him over to the desk. Barnes went to sit with the patients.   
  
“What did homeworld command say?” she asked.   
  
“The Colonel phoned in to report he’d just temporarily swapped back into his body when we dropped out of FTL. He said that Airman Daniels was torturing Rush somewhere on the ship, that he’d tied himself up and he wanted the connection to be severed immediately.” He sighed. “They went to pick up Daniels but he’d killed himself.”   
  
“How?” she asked.   
  
“Threw himself into the motel pool, bound hand and foot.”   
  
TJ grimaced.   
  
“How are they?” Scott asked.   
  
“Asleep.” She said. “The colonel hasn’t come round yet, but it’s just a matter of time and I sedated Rush.”   
  
Scott looked at her. TJ rubbed her face with her hand, pushing loose hair back out of her face.   
  
“Daniels tortured him Matt, for a long while.” She said. “He’s a mess, physically and emotionally. We couldn’t treat him conscious. He was conscious but traumatised when we arrived, and whoever had swapped with Channing was dead on the floor. My best guess is that the Colonel swapped back into his body, found himself with Rush, the second infiltrator arrived, shot Young and then Rush shot Channing. I’m guessing from where the blood was on the floor that Young was in front of Rush when he was shot. Rush was definitely the one who put the makeshift bandages on Young. Those quite probably saved his life.”   
  
“The airman who swapped with Channing hasn’t been found yet.” Scott said.   
  
“He’s dead whoever he is.” TJ said. “How could two infiltrators get onboard like this?” she demanded.   
  
Scott shook his head with a twist of his mouth. “I don’t know TJ. They must have been waiting a long time to get them both here though. Those schedules are really mixed around.” He shook his head. “What I can’t figure is who they are and what they wanted?”   
  
TJ shrugged. “It has to be something technical as they went for Rush. What will you tell the crew.”   
  
Scott took a deep breath.   
  
“That Rush was attacked by whoever came through the stones, and that Colonel Young was shot protecting him. You say they’re going to be okay.”   
  
“They’re stable.” She said. “As long as there’s no infection they should be physically fine in time.”   
  
Scott put his hand on her arm.   
  
“And emotionally?”   
  
TJ looked away.   
  
“I don’t know Matt. Rush is pretty messed up, I won’t go into details, but it went on for hours. I don’t know how he’s going to manage it. Young came back to his body to find out it was his body doing it and that’s got to have an effect as well.”   
  
Matt frowned. “I feel pretty bad myself. Nobody missed Rush.”   
  
“Who would?” said TJ. “He’s often off on his own doing things, and it was night time. He should have been in his quarters. You can’t blame yourself for that.”   
  
“Lieutenant!” Barnes voice was quiet but urgent.   
  
They both walked over to the curtains. TJ stepped through, Scott following.   
  
“He opened his eyes.” Barnes looked down at Young.   
  
TJ walked to the bedside.   
  
“Colonel?” she asked quietly.   
  
His eyes flickered open again.   
“TJ.” He licked his lips. “Is Rush…?”   
  
TJ’s eyes flickered over to the other bed and Young turned his head. Rush was still unconscious, laying on his side facing Young. The cuts on his face stood out keenly again the pallor of his skin.   
  
“He’s a mess, but he’s going to be okay physically.” She said. He eyes flickered sideways in the other direction and Young caught sight of Scott. They left the topic.   
  
“Lieutenant.” He acknowledged.   
  
“Glad you’re still alive.” Said Scott. “You had us worried.”   
  
“Take more than that to kill me.” Young snorted then winced.   
  
“You’re going to have to rest.” Said TJ firmly.   
  
“Okay,” Young looked back to Scott, “you’re in charge until I’m allowed out of here Lieutenant. Put Brody in charge of the scientists, but don’t let them start anything and listen hard to Camile, TJ and Eli.”   
  
“Same as always Colonel.” Said Scott.   
  
“Okay, out now.” TJ said. She looked at Barnes. “Thank you. You ought to get some rest too.”   
  
Barnes gave her a grateful look and followed Scott out of the infirmary.   
  
TJ watched them go and the door close then turned back to Young.   
  
“How many people know what happened.” He asked.   
  
“Pretty much everyone knows you were shot, that Rush was attacked. Scott, Eli, and Baras know that Rush was tortured, I expect Scott will have told Camile, Homeworld Command know anyway, so there’s no point in concealing that.” She took a long look at his face. “Only Barnes and I know the details of what was done to him.” She said. “And to you.”   
  
Young looked away.   
  
“We had to clean you both up,” she said quietly, “it wasn’t hard to see what had happened. She put her hand on his. “No-one is talking.”   
  
TJ sat herself on the edge of the bed, watching him, holding his hand. He was silent for a long time, staring into a non-existent distance before finally his gaze flicked to Rush and then back to TJ.   
  
“They were Lucian Alliance.” He said.   
  
“How do you know?”   
  
“The person in Channing said that Rush was…raped…because Daniels knew Simeon.”   
  
“What did they want?”   
  
Young shrugged with his good shoulder, and shook his head. “He didn’t say. Just that they had what they needed from Rush and he was going to kill him to stop him preventing them acting. It suggests that they’re trying to come back.”   
  
“Or that they don’t want anyone to know what information they got from Rush.” TJ speculated. “It could be something he knows from before. They might want him dead so he couldn’t let on what it was.”   
  
“Possibly.” Said Young. “Whatever it was they didn’t get to take it back.”   
  
“Rush shot him.” TJ said.   
  
“I didn’t even realise he had the gun.” Said Young. “I was trying to protect him.”   
  
Young laughed mirthlessly, his voice sounded awfully tired.   
  
“You need to sleep.” Said TJ.   
  
For a change Young didn’t argue and let her pull up the sheet.   
  
“How long did it take you to find us?” He asked as she settled the sheet round her shoulders.   
  
“Almost half an hour.”   
  
His eyes opened again, slowly but surprised.   
  
“I was shot twice.” He said.   
  
“By the time we found you, it appears Rush had put some makeshift pressure bandages on you, stopped the bleeding.” TJ looked down at him. “Come on, sleep. It’ll all still be here when you wake up.”   
  
She ran a cool hand over his forehead and he had to stop himself turning into her touch. She stood up and pulled the curtain round them. He closed his eyes and it wasn’t long before sleep overtook him.


End file.
